He estimates that each Microsoft Store had about 500 units. “[They] were completely sold out within the first 30 minutes,” Chowdhry wrote in a note to investors and reporters. During the promotional period, Microsoft sold the Aspire V5 for $399.

Not to be outdone, some Microsoft Stores also sold out of a $1,500 touch-enabled Ultrabook from Sony. “Sony Vaio Touch Intel i7 was the fastest selling Windows 8 notebook in the high-end category,” Chowdhry added.

While this may be the year that the desktop PC died, Dell has not given up on the market. And it’s a good thing, too — if it had, it could not have built the fastest-selling all-in-one Windows 8 desktop. On Black Friday, Dell’s XPS One 27 earned that crown.

Apart from PC OEMs, Chowdhry told that there was lot of interest for Microsoft Surface but interest was not necessarily leading to sales. He said people are waiting for Surface Pro running Intel processors.

“Had Microsoft first shipped Surface on Intel chips vs. on ARM chips, sales of Surface would have been 5X better than current levels,”

Unless people are looking for laptop/desktop replacements, the Surface Pro doesn’t necessarily qualify [to me] as an entertainment tablet.

I hesitate to think what it will be like to use for reading magazines/comics etc, as I found even the lighter [relatively] Acer W500 to be too heavy!

http://www.facebook.com/erichon99 Eric Hon

That’s interesting…I wonder if MSFT missed the ball by going to RT before PRO? I love the Surface RT that I have. All I need is Office, but I wish it came with Outlook and Access, but definitely Outlook. Hope to know if we might be able to get this in 2013.

Avatar Roku

The primary goal of Surface is not just selling hardware, but establishing WinRT and selling as many Windows RT devices as possible. They would sell far fewer ARM devices if they had launched Intel first or simultaneously. By selling more RT devices they create an incentive for developers to produce Windows RT apps.

When Windows RT reaches a big enough number of apps and evolution, consumers should no longer care about desktop apps anymore.

If Microsoft really only cared about selling maximum amount of hardware you would be able to buy Surface at any computer/electronics store. The whole purpose of Surface right now is just to push people in the direction that Microsoft wants them to move.

soggybiscuit

If Microsoft priced the Surface at $300-400 w/keyboard it would sold 5x more too

jimski27

When people see the $1,000 price tag on the Surface Pro (my guess w/o kb), the Surface RT is going to be looking mighty nice.

willdoors

I am waiting for Sirface INTEL….. RT is not a good choice at all! (and I own the RT version eh!)

http://www.facebook.com/people/Gavin-Tom/100001144097567 Gavin Tom

I think people are still confused at what the surface and windows RT really is. Not a laptop but a on the go ultra portable device that you can do work on. Does the same thing other tablets do just better and more work can be done on it. Like a Ferrari tablet. That’s my best metaphor haha its not even that good too. But again if you want a laptop go and buy a laptop, if you want a tablet that has the workability of a computer than the Surface is for you.